According to Dr Mike Loosemore – head of exercise medicine at UCL’s Institute of Sport Exercise and Health, and founder of Active Movement – most people are so far away from the government’s activity guidelines that they give up before they even start.
However, with physical inactivity now the fourth biggest killer, we can’t afford to let people give up on themselves. So what can the fitness sector do to help change the behaviour of the public at large?
Loosemore thinks the bar should be set very low: simply encouraging people to stand up, instead of sitting down, as a good starting point. He says one of the main problems we’re facing is that physical activity has been engineered out of our lives: the Housewife Survey in the US found that women with children under the age of five are doing 14 hours less exercise a week than 50 years ago, with the same calorie consumption.
So should part of operators’ offering involve tutoring people about how to bring activity back into their everyday lives? For example, clubs could encourage – and indeed help plan – a public transport commute: research from Transport for London has shown that people are more likely to hit 150 minutes’ activity a week if they use the underground. For those who have to drive a car, maybe they could be encouraged to park slightly further from their destination and run or walk the last bit? Apparently Cameron Diaz always runs from place to place on-set to boost her activity levels, so what exercises could we give people to do at their desks, or while waiting for the kettle to boil?
Do we need to create a new form of membership for people who are not yet ready for the health club experience, coaching them to change their eating habits and start to get active in a less intimidating environment? This might not create new members instantly, but it can still drive revenue and may provide future members.
Going forward, changing behaviour is definitely going to become increasingly important, so how should operators go about it? We ask the experts....